Happily Ever After (2 page)

“What about the little boy?” Sophie asked. Her
papa stood, drawing the covers up to her neck. He tucked her in snugly and he
smiled down at her, a little more sadly still. “He grew up to be a terrible daddy,
who never was home and gave his sweet little daughter terrible, terrible
advice. Just pretend you didn’t hear a word of that story, Sophie ... Go to
sleep and dream of angels as sweet as you.”

It would be silly to pretend she hadn’t heard him,
but it was easy enough to put his story out of her mind. Sophie didn’t
understand a word that he was saying to her. “I love you, Papa,” she murmured
as he caressed her cheek. “You’re the best Papa in the whole world!”

She turned then, cuddling her pillow, her shark’s
tooth tucked in her hand safely beneath it. She heard him walk away and gently
close the door... and then she dreamt of riding on the backs of golden whales
over sweeping blue oceans while her daddy stood by and watched and waved.

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CHAPTER 1

Boston, 1899

The evidence seemed undeniable.

It was, in fact, her fiancé’s penmanship, but just
to be certain Sophie withdrew her most recent letter from Harlan from her
private desk, meticulously comparing the handwriting. She studied both letters
side by side, trying to find some difference in the script.

Behind her, Jonathon Preston opened the drapes a
bit wider, letting in every last ray of afternoon sun, giving her ample light
to see by. “I would never have brought it to you,” he claimed, somewhat more
eagerly now that she had begun to take the matter seriously. He stood at her
side, peering over her shoulder, and his razor-sharp scrutiny of her while she
read the letter made her cheeks bum with both anger and humiliation.

She swallowed uncomfortably.

No matter how much she wished to find the letter a
forgery, the penmanship was the same; identical long-tailed y’s looping
purposely about to cross simple t’s... precisely dotted i’s and j’s. Harlan
rarely capitalized the names of his acquaintances... nor did he ever capitalize
hers, though his invariably was—something that plagued her acutely.

“Although Harlan has always been a friend to me,
it seemed somehow unconscionable,” Jonathon continued, “that you should be treated
with so little regard!”

Sophie doubted Jonathon’s intentions were at all
honorable. He might have sold his soul to the devil for her father’s favor.
Still, she was not the sort who preferred not to know. If her fiancé was making
her out to be a fool, then she certainly did wish to know about it—no
matter what Jonathon’s motives for relaying the information.

And, damnation, it seemed Harlan was, indeed,
making a fool of her!

Her entire future suddenly crumpled before her
like an old castle in some forgotten fairy tale, all of her carefully laid
plans reduced to rubble and her dreams blown away like so much dust.

What a fool she had been.

She peered up at Jonathon to find him still
staring at her, as though he expected her to burst into heart-wrenching sobs
any instant. Sophie frowned. No doubt he would enjoy that. Well, she wasn’t
about to give in to hysterics! Anyway, she shuddered to think of Jonathon
comforting her.

Strange how before today she had not thought him
quite so nefarious, but the boy she remembered from her youth was gone, and in
his place stood a gleaming-eyed, calculating man. No, she had no doubt of
Jonathon’s intentions, and less of his motivations. Her father was a powerful
and beneficent man—witnessed by the generosity and support he had
bestowed on Harlan. From the day Harlan had departed Boston, his best friend
had set out to woo not her, but her father.

Drat men and their love for money!

Her eyes stung as she scanned the letter Jonathon
had brought her, this time allowing herself full comprehension of the words
scribbled so neatly before her.

God help her, she refused to weep—and
certainly not before Jonathon Preston.

She examined the envelope again. It was postmarked
April 20, 1899. Two months ago—ironic that he should have written this
letter on the third anniversary of their engagement. She wondered if Harlan
even realized.

My good
friend,
the letter began.

Sophie glanced up at Jonathon, wondering
implausibly how he could betray his
good
friend so easily. Her emotions were in tumult. She didn’t know whether to be
grateful or angry at the man standing so gleefully at her side. And yet, how
could she, even now, think to championing Harlan? Why should she even care that
Jonathon had played his Judas?

She read the letter carefully.

You really
must join me here directly! Give no more objections, jon! It is a wondrous
world that not merely allows us the opportunity to experience life’s most
bountiful pleasures, but in fact grants us to do so! Every man should have such
an understanding fiancée, eh? And a father-in-law willing to support his cause.
I count myself fortunate, indeed—yes, indeed—to have won the heart
of sophia vanderwahl, but do not think me unappreciative if I do not rush home
to the encumbrances of matrimony.

His choice of words stung.

Encumbrance.

So that’s what he thought of her?

She took a deep breath and continued.

At any rate,
dear friend, I hardly think you can say sophia is wasting away. She is young
enough still that she might bear my children were I to delay the nuptials five,
even six more years. And neither are her spirits low; her letters are buoyant
and full with interest in my studies. She’s a peach to affect such an interest
in matters that would only bore her to the grave. Women have not the patience or
capacity for such ruminations, jon. But do not concern yourself with sophia, my
good friend. She is most loyal, to be sure, and will await me with the grace
she was raised to show. Indeed, I could not have chosen better.

Sophie grit her teeth, resisting the urge to
crumple the letter.

Loyal
,
was she?

A peach
,
was she?

Anger surged through her.

Her interest had hardly been feigned! Her
questions had been born of legitimate interest—and how dare Harlan assume
she would wait
five, even six more years
until he deigned to return to her! And yet it was hardly that particular
narrative that incensed her most. Her eyes skimmed the pages until she came to
the paragraph in which he began to tempt Jon...

... and the
women here are the most lovely... skin so velvet brown and eyes so deep a black
a man may sigh to see his own reflection in their depths. And hair... Christ, I
have never had the joy of touching hair so rich it flows through one’s hands
like the mane of a fine riding horse. (And they love to be ridden, jon... I
know this firsthand.)

Sophie was not such a moron that she did not
understand his meaning, even if she did not know exactly what that meant. Her
cheeks burned with both anger and mortification.

“Forgive me, Sophia, I did not wish to mask even
the worst of it,” Jonathon interjected, interpreting correctly the flush on her
cheeks. “You had a right to know.”

Sophie nodded, too shaken for words, even after
reading the letter for the third time.

She forced herself to continue.

... never
have I known women so earthy in nature. If you experience the carnal joy of one
woman’s bosom, you must not think her the exception because the next will make
you yearn to feel her native soil between your toes forever and run like a
savage through the jungles of her birth. You will nearly forget you are a
civilized man and never again wish to languish in the misery that is Boston.
Not for all the vanderwahl money would I be dragged so soon from this paradise!

Sophie winced at the not so subtle reminder that
it was her father’s money, not her, that would most likely bring him
back—and not even her father’s money was enough! He was enjoying himself
far too well at Vanderwahl expense!

And she couldn’t help but notice that he couldn’t
even be bothered to capitalize her surname.

Sorrow was at once replaced with cold fury, and
armed with anger, she reread the last passages.

Even here in
the wilds I have received word of jack macauley’s reckless venture... his
purchase of that deuced old ship... the miss deed, is it? In any case, he must
be ready to set sail soon. Entreat upon him, if you will, to give you passage.
He would make room for you, I’m certain. His pockets have grown quite shallow.
In the meantime, I shall hand choose the most luscious native girl, and let no
man sample her but you. Join me, jon, and you will hardly wonder why I must
convince sophia’s father to purchase me more time. Between the two of us we
could surely convince him of our potential here. He is eager for grandchildren
and alone I will not prevail.

Come, my
good friend. Your presence is the one thing I find I sorely miss.

Your loyal
friend and associate, Harlan Horatio Penn III

Jon’s company was the
one
thing he sorely missed, was it? Not hers?

How could she not have realized sooner how little
interest he held in her? Just the other night Sophie had viciously defended him
to her friend Maggie when Maggie dared imply his interest had waned. Why had it
taken a letter from him to Jonathon for her to realize what was apparently
quite obvious to everybody else?

She slumped over the letter. She tried so hard to
be everything everyone wanted her to be—the best daughter, the best
girlfriend—she shouldn’t wear her décolletage too high, or too low. She
wasn’t supposed to weep, nor was she supposed to laugh too loudly.

She set down her own letter from Harlan, with all
its sweet lies, on the desktop, and kept the other in hand, unwilling to
relinquish the damning evidence, forgetting just for an instant to keep her
shoulders even—a lady never slumped, you see, not even in the most
distressing of situations.

“Is everything quite all right, Miss Sophia?”

Sophie straightened and looked reassuringly at
their longtime butler, Harold, who stood in the doorway. In her parents’
eternal absence, Sophie was the lady of the manor. She had been groomed well by
her mother, and she managed the household meticulously, but it was only in that
very instant, as Harold looked in upon her, that she suddenly wondered who
exactly was looking after whom.

“Everything is fine, Harold,” she assured. “I’m
fine,” she lied.

He cocked his head at her as though he didn’t
quite believe her. “Are you quite certain, Miss Sophia?”

Sophie waved him away, choking on a wave of grief.
“Quite. It’s nothing I can’t manage.”

The older man smiled affectionately at her. “As
always, Miss Sophia.” He cast a suspicious glance at Jonathon and left,
assuring her, “I shall be right here in the hall should you require my
presence.”

Sophie smiled to herself. Harold was, as ever, her
guardian angel. If she knew him well—and, indeed, she did—he would,
in fact, remain just outside the door, dusting the same picture frame over and
over until Jonathon Preston left the premises. In fact, were it up to Harold,
he would have never have allowed Jonathon entrance at all. Harold was far more
protective of her than even her own father. But then her father and mother
always expected her to do the right thing. They never doubted for an instant
that Sophie would always adhere to her good breeding.

“Sophia,” Jonathon prompted.

Sophie looked up at him. He seemed suddenly to
take up far too much of her breathing space.

All at once everything seemed far too
confining—her father’s house, her predictable manners, even her dress.

She had every right to be angry!

Why couldn’t she ever allow herself a single
instant of real emotion? Why must she always be perfect? Always be strong?
Always do the right thing? She wanted to shout and cry and break things! She
eyed a photo of Harlan on her desk and didn’t dare touch it.

She sucked in a breath and stood calmly, clutching
Jonathon’s letter to her breast. Her fingers unconsciously curled about the
parchment, crinkling the fine paper. Fury constricted her throat—not
sorrow, not fear, but unrelieved fury.

How dare Harlan take advantage of her father!

How dare he use and discard them both so easily!

“Oh, dear! I see how much this has upset you,
Sophie. Perhaps I should not have come,” Jonathon proposed. He set a hand
gingerly upon her shoulder.

Sophie shrugged out from under his touch and
brushed past him, swallowing her temper, trying to regain her composure.

Three years ago, with her mother’s and her
father’s avid blessings, she had promised herself to Harlan. Three years and
two months she had waited for him to come home and marry her, so that she could
go and make them another perfect home. She had gladly rebuffed the advances of
all her would-be suitors until every last one of her friends was wed, and only
Sophie remained. And still she had waited, content in the knowledge that her
darling Harlan would someday return from some faraway exotic land to claim her
for his bride—like some knight in shining armor.

Poppycock!

They were supposed to have lived happily ever
after... together with three children and a miniature pony for their
daughter—all nothing but a young girl’s foolishness!